


Small

by someonestolemyshoes



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Drabble, Fluff, M/M, kageyama just loves his smol spiker okay, loves him and he hates it
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-09-18
Updated: 2016-05-02
Packaged: 2018-04-21 10:05:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 6,436
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4824746
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/someonestolemyshoes/pseuds/someonestolemyshoes
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kageyama likes little things. Maybe it’s because he’s just so big, or maybe it’s because small is inherently cute or maybe it’s because of some deep evolutionary instinct to squeeze and coddle and protect the tiny but regardless of the reasons, Kageyama just loves little things. </p><p>Which is fine. </p><p>What isn’t fine is that Hinata - irksome, noisy, hyperactive Hinata - is little, so little, and Kageyama shouldn’t like him at all because he’s annoying, he’s loud and messy and he never stops, but he is small and Kageyama likes small. </p><p>Kageyama likes small and, by extension, Kageyama likes Hinata.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Small

**Author's Note:**

> This is just a small, semi-fluffy drabble that I wanted to post because I haven't posted fic in weeks and it feels wrong.

They’re on the bus home, the first time he really notices it. The practice match had been long and trying and they’d lost, in the end, and while Kageyama silently seethes in his seat - because loosing fucking  _sucks_ , practice match or not - Hinata is vibrating beside him, eyes blown wide and fingers itching against the seat in front of him as he  _gwaa’_ s and  _fwaa’_ s his way through the match highlights. 

And then he’s asleep. 

There’s no transition period; one minute he is there, craning over the chair, muscles bouncing like the game is still in play and the next he is snoring, head pillowed on Kageyama’s shoulder, and his hair is tickling Kageyama’s neck and brushing the underside of his jaw and it’s when he looks down, eyes narrowed and mouth ready to bark, that it hits him.

Hinata is  _tiny_. 

He is tiny, and his face is slack in sleep and there’s this little pout to his lip and then he turns his head, nuzzles his face into the collar of Kageyama’s jacket and sighs out one long, exhausted breath and  _god_. Cute. Hinata is _cute_. 

He thinks it’s okay, thinks he can stand the journey if he stares out the window and ignores the feel of Hinata’s breath breezing over his neck and maybe he could, but then Hinata shifts, curls the fingers of one hand into Kageyama’s sleeve and he’s screwed, he’s so  _so_ screwed because those fingers are tiny, thin and small and delicate and they would drown in his own. 

* * *

It’s a Wednesday the second time it hits him, and Hinata is bleary-eyed and blinking and very probably, according to Suga at least, concussed. 

It doesn’t look that bad, as far as Hinata’s injuries go - a slip and a fall and a  _crack_ and it’s stupid, really, dumb and completely avoidable, and Kageyama has a scathing comment paused at the tip of his tongue but Hinata doesn’t get up, doesn’t laugh or joke or even  _cry_ , just curls on his side with his fingers fisted in his hair and lies still. 

He’s seen Hinata hurt himself more times than he can count but this, this is unsettling, because Kageyama knows that Hinata is made of rubber - he drops and falls and bounces back and yeah, he gets fiery and he gets riled but he’s  _always_ (miraculously) unscathed.

Suga is the first to move, to help, and Kageyama thinks he might have beat him to it if somebody hadn’t glued his shoes to the floor and  _god_  the air is so thin, so willowy and he has to suck a couple of hard, deep lungfuls to stave off the weird, heavy feeling in his chest. 

Hinata is upright by the time Kageyama crosses the court, and Kageyama has his face set in a scowl, ready to berate, but then Hinata is blinking the gym light out of his eyes and teasing his fingers over his scalp and he’s just…just sitting there, on the floor at Kageyama’s feet, looking sleepy and pained and confused and  _so small_. 

“He needs to see the nurse,” Suga says, “he might have a concussion.” And everyone is looking at Kageyama, all earnest and expectant and he helps Hinata to his feet with a frown. 

“Dumbass,” he says, because Hinata is mumbling  _I’m fine_  under his breath even as he sways where he stands, eyes pinched and face twisted and all his weight braced on Kageyama’s side.  _I’m fine_ , he says, but there’s a bruise webbing out from his hairline and over his temple, faint but building, and his skin is pale, lips white and limbs shaking. 

It’s as they’re leaving the gym that it really hits him, with Hinata heaved onto his back, arms draped over his shoulders and thighs pressed into his hips; he weighs  _nothing_ , light as a feather, and his breath is warm where it fans over Kageyama’s collar and the skin of his cheek is hot and soft and pressed right into Kageyama’s neck. 

* * *

They’re in Kageyama’s room the third time, dripping rain water onto the carpet and sucking air like nothing else because they ran back from practice in a desperate, failed attempt to avoid the storm rolling in. 

“I’m  _freezing_ ,” Hinata says, whining and hugging his arms around his middle. “Why is your house so cold?” 

“My house isn’t cold, dumbass. We’re  _soaked_.” 

Anything he owns is going to be too big for Hinata and he knows this, but Kageyama still pries his smallest, oldest jumper out of the wardrobe, and a pair of shorts with a drawstring that might  _just_  pull tight enough, and he throws them at Hinata along with a spare towel and shoves him from the room to change. 

He’s toweling his hair when the door creeps open, and when he peeks out from under the fabric, he chokes. 

Hinata is  _swimming_  in his clothes. The hem of the jumper creeps right the way down over his thighs and his hands are buried in the sleeves, and his eyes look wider and brighter than Kageyama has ever seen them and  _oh no_. 

Oh no. The pale, freckled skin of Hinata’s shoulder is peaking out where the collar has fallen over his arm, and Kageyama traces the line of Hinata’s collarbone from shoulder to throat and his eyes trail up, follow the sinews of his neck to his jaw and since when did tiny, bitesize Hinata look this  _good_.  

This is a problem.

It’s a problem, because Kageyama has always liked little things. Maybe it’s because he’s just so  _big_ , or maybe it’s because small is inherently cute or maybe it’s because of some deep evolutionary instinct to squeeze and coddle and protect the tiny but regardless of the reasons, Kageyama just loves little things.

Which is fine.

What  _isn’t_ fine is that Hinata - irksome, noisy, hyperactive Hinata - is little,  _so_  little, and Kageyama shouldn’t like him at all because he’s  _annoying_ , he’s loud and messy and he never stops, but he is  _small_  and Kageyama likes small.

Kageyama likes small and, by extension, Kageyama likes Hinata.

And Kageyama is learning, in some terrible, unexpectedly  _rude_  awakening that he likes Hinata  _far too much_. 


	2. Fit For A King

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kageyama isn’t the only one in the photograph. Hinata is with him, too, palms pressed to the gym floor and his head turned up to look right into Kageyama’s face, wearing that ridiculous flower crown with its sagging, wilting leaves and stems and petals, eyes bright and alive and Kageyama’s never really noticed before, how the sleeves of his jacket slide a little too far over his hands, how the collar creeps right up to his jaw, how the fabric hangs just the slightest bit too big over his frame, and he can see now why the Him in the picture looks the way he does.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> SO here is a second chapter. Rather than a coherent ongoing story with an actual plot and all that jazz, this is more than likely going to be a little collection of chronological fics in which Kags is 'coping' with how cute Hinata is and yeah (also props to @ smol-synth on tumblr for helping me come up with the idea!!)
> 
> EDIT: Now includes art!!! Because my pal reallycorking on tumblr drew an AMAZING little piece for me to go with this and I am crying a bit

Kageyama has never had all that much trouble working with his hands. He can shuffle a deck of cards, draw a decent picture and he’s not half-bad at origami and then, of course, there’s volleyball.

So it’s frustrating to say the least that he can’t work out how to make a stupid flower crown.  

It was Suga’s suggestion, to make the damn things in the first place. _It’ll be fun_ , he’d said, _relaxing_. The entire activity was supposed to _relieve_ some stress, was supposed to be peaceful and quiet and entertaining, and then Hinata had to open his big, stupid mouth.

“Mine will be better than yours,” he’d said, and Kageyama knew then and there that nothing about this activity was going to be relaxing.

“Like hell,” he’d said, and yet he’d had to wait for Hinata to pick out his supplies before he could grab his own because in truth, he’d had absolutely no idea what to do.

Ten minutes later, he’s still no better off.

He’s got three cuts from the wire before he’s even twisted it into something that even resembles a circle, and when he casts his eyes sideways Hinata is already threading greenery with little, nimble fingers and his tongue is peaking out against his lip as he works and there’s a flush, light and pink, dusting over his cheeks and Kageyama glares down at the wobbly mess of wire in his lap to stop himself from staring.  

Kageyama teases his thumbs and fingers around the wire, tries to straighten it out and pricks himself in the palm with one exposed end. Beside him, Hinata is eyeing up his pile of flowers as he works, and Kageyama gives up on trying to tidy his circle in favour of grabbing a clumsy handful of greenery.

The first several pieces end up shredded over his knees, a few sorry vines hanging from his wire, and he stares over at Hinata and lets out one long, angry huff.

“How the hell are you so good at this,” he says, and Hinata glances over and snickers into the back of his hand. “Stop _laughing_ , dumbass, and tell me what to do.”

Hinata holds his crown – looking green and leafy and there isn’t a single piece of wire visible – behind his back and shakes his head, hard.

“Why would I help you if I want to win?”

Kageyama glowers and growls under his breath, then turns his back to Hinata and continues mangling vines and leaves and long, thick grass blades over his wire.

It takes a while, but it’s starting to look something like a sad, sorry crown and he can hear Hinata humming behind him and when he peers over his shoulder to look at him, he chokes.

Hinata’s balancing his crown atop his head and fiddling with the flowers blooming over the front of it. They’re bright, oranges and yellows and reds and there’s a few whites, purples and blues, tiny little flowers with hundreds of delicate petals weaved into the leaves, and there’s something about the smile on his face, his closed eyes and the way the sun spills through the window, slips through his hair and over his shoulders that makes Kageyama’s stomach go tight in the most pleasant kind of way.

But then he sees the completed crown and everything falls into anger and frustration and he swings his head back towards his own, pitiful replica hard enough to crack his neck.

“Nearly done?” Hinata asks, voice high and lilted and there’s something just a little smug in his tone. Kageyama scowls, grabs a few flowers and shoves them unceremoniously into the soggy-looking leaves and the bent wire and he displays it with a scowl dark enough to make Hinata flinch.

It’s a sorry sight; it’s more square than anything else, and everything is drooping, torn stems and ripped petals and there are a few flowers that have been pulled in two, and Kageyama holds his face hard and still to fight his blush as laughter bubbles out of Hinata and rings throughout the room.

“Nice try, Yamayama,” he says, presses his palm over his mouth and chuckles through his fingers and Kageyama clenches his hand so hard around the crown the wire bends even more.

“Where did you even learn to make these?” Kageyama asks, grits his teeth and glares at the stupid, perfect crown perched atop Hinata’s hair. Hinata’s cheeks are already flushed from laughing but they colour more still at Kageyama’s question.

“Natsu,” he says, “I make them for her a lot.”

Kageyama stubbornly refuses to think it’s cute, refuses to think about the hours Hinata must have spent shaping crown after crown for his little sister until he got it perfect, refuses to think about Big Brother Hinata doting on his tiny, noisy miniature, refuses to think about Hinata at _all_.   

Face entirely too warm, Kageyama stares at his fingers where they dig into his own crown. He’s trying to think of something to say, but his mouth is dry and his tongue feels thick and heavy and everything is hot, his face and his hands and his chest, and he’s about to tell Hinata that maybe he doesn’t feel too good, that the competition wasn’t fair, that they should try again another day when he doesn’t feel like his entire being might just float away, when he’s watched a few hundred tutorials on how to make the perfect flower crown, but then there’s the lightest pressure atop his head and he darts a hand up to see what it is.

Beneath his fingers he feels petals, silky and soft, and he can smell grass and pollen and something sweet that might be Hinata’s shampoo, and Hinata pries his fingers off of his own sorry excuse for a crown and Kageyama looks up to see him settle it on his own head.

It’s far too big, and even with the odd bends and bumps and the sheer volume of Hinata’s hair it still slips down, angles itself until it rests on a diagonal across Hinata’s forehead. Soggy, broken leaves dip into his eye and Hinata squints up at Kageyama, grins like he’s just received the best damn present in the world, and reaches up to adjust the crown on Kageyama’s head.

“A crown fit for a King,” he says, but there’s no bite in his tone, and Kageyama thinks that maybe the nickname isn’t so bad when Hinata says it. He trails his gaze over Hinata’s head once, twice, three times, and points at it.

“That looks horrible.”

Hinata snickers again, pushes a few petals out of his lashes and when a leaf droops down against his nose he rolls his eyes in until they’re crossed and it makes Kageyama’s heart _hurt._ He reaches over, flicks the greenery out of Hinata’s face and then flicks him on the forehead for good measure and Hinata reels back, slaps his palm against the skin and points an accusing finger.

“What was that for, _bakayama!”_

Kageyama grins, mouth twisting up over one cheek, and ruffles the hair atop Hinata’s head. Hinata pouts, glares up at him, and Kageyama pulls his hand off of Hinata’s hair before he can really think about how soft it feels beneath his fingers.

“Eighty-two wins for you,” Kageyama says, and Hinata’s grin is blinding and when he pushes his face all the way into Kageyama’s space his eyes are brighter than he’s ever seen them and he’s so, so small where he fits in close beneath Kageyama’s frame, and it’s almost impossible to believe someone so tiny can give off so much _heat_. He’s angled his face all the way up and back to look at Kageyama, and Kageyama can feel the warmth of his breath against his face and neck and it’s all he can do to stop himself sliding back and placing five thousand feet between them before he does something he will most definitely regret.

“And only eighty losses,” Hinata says, presses his face so close Kageyama can smell the mint on his breath, “you’re falling behind, Kageyama.”

Kageyama palms his face away, turns to hide his blush because he can’t stop thinking about the way Hinata’s cheek fits against his hand, the way the soggy leaves and petals of the flower press against his fingertips, the way Hinata winks his eye closed because Kageyama’s thumb is just a little too close to it and _god_ he’s something so, so close to adorable and it’s _killing_ him.

“Dumbass,” he says, and Hinata pulls a face, stretches his tongue out the side of his mouth until it presses, wet and squirming and _gross_ (it should be, it should be disgusting but Kageyama isn’t sure that it really is at all), against the heel of his hand. Kageyama wrenches out of his grip, wipes his palm over his pants, stares daggers at Hinata and he opens his mouth to say something that he hopes will come across as threatening but then Hinata is laughing. Real, hard, stomach-clutching laughter, head thrown back and eyes squeezed closed and Kageyama can do nothing but stare and he’s not quite sure whether to be affronted or not.

“What’s funny?” He says – demands – and Hinata wipes at his eyes and takes a few deep, steadying breaths.

“You just,” he begins, spits out a few giggles before he can get the rest of his words out, “you don’t look scary at _all_ with _that_.”

Kageyama remembers the crown on his head with a jolt, reaches up to touch it with light, tentative fingers – because Hinata made it and he doesn’t want to wreck it and, clearly, all he can do with flowers is cause carnage.

He wants to say something – a thank you, maybe, something kind and friendly and _not_ mean – but there are a thousand butterflies in his stomach and his chest and he can’t get the words to come out and as soon as he can, as soon as he opens his mouth to say _something_ , Hinata’s on his feet and bounding over to the door where the third years are sitting, talking quietly amongst themselves, and Kageyama can’t bring himself to say a word in front of them.  

* * *

 

When Kageyama walks into the gym the next morning, he’s greeted by grinning, laughing faces and pressing hands to his shoulders and Noya’s voice ringing in his ear and everyone else is hovering around Suga and, more importantly, Suga’s phone. Kageyama eyes it, suspicious, and Noya’s fingers dig into his back as he pushes him towards the group.

Tsukishima has his fingers braced over his mouth and there’s a disgusting kind of mirth lighting his eyes and Kageyama scowls on principle, then looks at Suga, at the phone, at his teammates, and finally back at Suga. He looks a little uncertain but he’s smiling, and Kageyama quirks a brow and tries to keep his face neutral.

“It’s nothing,” Suga says, but Noya and Tanaka give a few lewd snickers behind his back and Suga’s smile falters, just a little. “I took some pictures yesterday,” he continues, “and I got a nice one of you.” Suga smiles again, mostly innocent, but there’s a kind of teasing in his eyes that makes Kageyama think _nice_ maybe isn’t the word he wanted to use but when Suga turns the screen to him, Kageyama realises just why everyone is acting the way they are.  

Kageyama isn’t the only one in the photograph. Hinata is with him, too, palms pressed to the gym floor and his head turned up to look right into Kageyama’s face, wearing that ridiculous flower crown with its sagging, wilting leaves and stems and petals, eyes bright and alive and Kageyama’s never really noticed before, how the sleeves of his jacket slide a little too far over his hands, how the collar creeps right up to his jaw, how the fabric hangs just the slightest bit too big over his frame, and he can see now why the Him in the picture looks the way he does.

His eyes are open wide and staring, and there’s a flush of red spread high on his cheeks and he can see the lightest pinch of his teeth against his lip and it’s the closest to sheepish he’s ever seen himself look. And next to him, pressed in his shadow, Hinata looks even smaller and it makes Kageyama’s heart thud fat and full and heavy in his chest.

Kageyama knows he’s been staring for too long, feels the heat bloom up his neck and settle on his face, and Suga closes the picture with a smile that might be kind, might be a little sly, and slips his phone back into his bag while Kageyama hides his face under the pretense of removing his jacket.

“Suits you,” Tsukishima says, cocks his mouth in a grin, “a crown fit for a _King_.”

The phrase makes Kageyama’s blood boil – in part, because it’s Tsukki and the nickname always burns rolling off of his tongue but mostly because Hinata had said it, too, and it had sounded far nicer and felt far warmer and now it feels…tainted, almost.  

Yamaguchi must feel Kageyama’s temper because he pinches the sleeve of Tsukki’s jacket, tugs a little to get his attention, and Kageyama hears him mumble something quiet and then they’re walking away and Kageyama is left standing, tight and tense and then Hinata’s voice is ringing out through the gym and something so pleasantly warm floods through Kageyama that for a moment, he can’t even remember why he’s angry.

Hinata is out of breath, cheeks and nose bitten red from the cold and his collar sits angled on his shoulders, pulled too far to one side as though he’d rushed to put it on. He’s panting, just a little, enough to pull his shoulders up and back with every heavy inhale and Kageyama grabs a volleyball from the cart and twists it between his fingers just for an excuse to look away.  

It never fails to amaze him, the way Hinata’s eyes light up when he so much as _sees_ a damn volleyball and today is much the same, when Kageyama spins the ball between his palms and Hinata perks up like a dog for a bone but today, with his wide, bright eyes and his beaming smile and his red cheeks, all Kageyama can see is his stupid, stupid flower crown decorating his head and then he’s thinking of that picture and his own stupid, smitten face and he throws the ball at Hinata hard enough to knock the breath out of him when he catches it.

“Hey!” Hinata shouts, huffs out a breath, slaps his palm against the ball and squeezes it between his fingers. Kageyama can’t bring himself to look him in the face because he _knows_ what he’ll see; he’ll see small, pouting Hinata; tiny frowning brows and little jutting lips and he knows he can’t cope with looking at that right now.

It only when Ukai calls them all in that Kageyama allows himself to really think about it.

Hinata isn’t even _that_ much smaller than him, he reasons, sliding his eyes sideways to look at him; just small enough, maybe, to slot his head right under Kageyama’s chin and he can picture it, Hinata’s damp, sweaty hair tickling the skin over his jaw, the warmth of his breath on his skin, the feel of his mouth where it would rest against his collar and his hands, small, thin fingers clinging to the fabric of his shirt and _god_ , no.

He should not be thinking about this. Not now, not _ever_.

He shouldn’t be thinking about how narrow his hips are, how well they’d fit in the palms of his hands or between his thighs, or how soft his lips look, how they might feel against his cheek or his neck or his mouth or under his tongue and he most _definitely_ shouldn’t be thinking about his-

-it isn’t until everyone around him screams out a short, echoing, “Yes!” that Kageyama realises he hasn’t heard a word Ukai has said to them and, on top of that, his groin feels a little too warm and a little too tight and then Hinata’s fingers curl around his wrist, soft and warm and Kageyama stares down at them, traces the lines of his knuckles and tries hard as he can to think about _anything_ other than Hinata’s hands on his skin.

“We can pair up, let’s go,” Hinata says, and Kageyama slides his wrist from his grip with a shake of his head.

“Don’t feel well,” he lies, tugs the hem of his shirt as low as he can and slinks out of the gym without another word. He can feel eyes – multiple pairs – burning into his back but he absolutely cannot turn around, cannot look at them, _especially_ cannot look at _Hinata_ and before he knows it he’s half-walked half-ran his way out the school gates, over the road and he stops in the middle of the park, eyes on his shoes and his hands still holding his shirt in place.

Kageyama drops to sit with a sigh, fists a handful of grass and plucks it up, rains it down onto his shoes and watches each blade fall and he’s trying so damn hard to _not_ think about ginger hair and amber eyes and rosy cheeks and flower crowns and he’s caught up so deep in his own head – thoughts of puppies and grandmas and wrinkly old men and anything but Hinata – that he doesn’t even realise Hinata is sitting beside him until he pokes him in the arm.

“Hey,” he says, pokes again, and Kageyama slides a little way away from him. “Why’d you leave? You sick?”

“So sick,” Kageyama says, and clears his throat. He daren’t even look in Hinata’s direction because he knows what he’ll see; he’ll see small and cute and that _something_ he doesn’t want to put a name to and he’s uncomfortable enough as it is without the real, visual reminder.

“Don’t look it,” Hinata mumbles, and Kageyama listens to him shuffle around beside him, listens to the tear of grass as he wrenches it out of the soil and things go quiet for a little while. Kageyama lets himself breathe.

When he does look over, Hinata is threading daisies together one after another in a long, thin chain. Kageyama watches his nimble fingers pick holes and weave stems one after another after another and it’s almost hypnotic, and then Hinata looks up at him with huge, round eyes and a small smile and he stretches up and pops the chain atop Kageyama’s head.

“You should go home,” Hinata says, “if you don’t feel good.”

Kageyama swallows, wills himself to nod, but all he can do is stare because from this close, he can see the fine sprinkling of freckles across Hinata’s nose and cheeks, and he can smell the honey of his shampoo and hear the whoosh of air in his lungs and it’s almost too much.

“You’re small,” he says, and it’s meant to be an explanation; an apology of sorts, but Hinata just reels back, face lit in indignation and he folds his arms hard and fast over his chest and huffs out a heavy breath.

“Yeah?” He says, “well you’re…you’re…” he flounders, rolls his eyes and clenches his fists and his cheeks puff up and after a moment he settles on, “Mean. _Meanie-yama._ ”

Kageyama lunges out a hand and grips the hair on Hinata’s head, tangles his fingers into the strands and tugs, just enough so Hinata squawks his discomfort and then he stops, lets his hand rest in Hinata’s hair and scrapes his scalp with his nails.

“It’s a _good thing_ ,” Kageyama says, and he tacks on a quiet, “ _dumbass_ ,” for good measure.

The way Hinata looks at him - eyes wide and bright and hopeful, mouth slack and awed, like he’s just been told he’s the best spiker in Japan, in the _world_ – makes something in Kageyama’s chest tighten so hard and so fast that his whole body falters, jolts and jumps and kick-starts again and then Hinata’s on his feet, pointer finger aimed right at the end of Kageyama’s nose.

“You,” he says, “are definitely sick. Or maybe…” his eyes go bug-wide, and he jabs his finger, face set like it’s supposed to be brave, “who are you and what have you done with the _real_ Kageyama?”

“Idiot Hinata,” Kageyama says, slaps his hand away, “I’m _me_ , and I’m fine.”

Hinata looks at him with thin, narrowed eyes, and Kageyama pushes himself to stand and for a moment they do nothing but stare at one another. Hinata’s gaze is judging; assessing, like he’s trying to spot a lie, and he must come up blank because one minute he’s there and the next he’s tearing across the grass and towards the road, throwing taunts and jeers over his shoulders at Kageyama.

“Hey!” Kageyama shouts, takes off after him, pumps his legs as hard as he can to catch up and he can hear the lilt of Hinata’s laughter carrying back on the wind, see the sweep of his hair and the cling of his shirt and then he’s ahead of him, because, yeah, Hinata looks good (so god damn _good_ ), but _winning_ is far more important.

It’s when they’re outside the gym, Hinata sprawled on his back and Kageyama with his hands braced on his knees, head hung low, that he remembers the daisy chain. It’s still clinging to his hair, raining loose petals onto the concrete, and Kageyama pulls it off and dangles it from one finger. He can see Hinata through the loop of it, with his eyes shut tight as he heaves to catch his breath and for a little while he allows himself to stare, breathe held in his lungs, and then he slips the flowers into the pocket of his shorts and kicks hit toes against Hinata’s ankle.

“Up, we need to start drills,” he says, nudges Hinata again and leans in a little closer, “and that’s eighty- _one_ wins for me, dumbass.”  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is super rushed BUT it's a birthday gift and I wanted to get it out before my uni week starts because I won't have any time to do it afterwards so I am sorry in advance but also thank u for reading/comments/kudos/bookmarks and all that jazz 
> 
> (feel free to follow me on tumblr @ someone-stole-my-shoes if you wanna talk kagehina to me wink wink)


	3. Naps and Blankets

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is steadily becoming a one-shot dump of overwhelmed kags and hinata being an adorable baby and I am 100% okay with that   
> Also quick warning!! There is some super brief referencing to masturbation but nothing graphic, it's more just hinted!! But skip this chapter if you're not okay with that!!

Hinata, Kageyama has learned, doesn’t really know how to stay still. It’s something he’s gotten used to, for the most part; Hinata is always running, jumping, flapping his arms or pointing his fingers and when he isn’t doing that, when he isn’t being obnoxiously theatrical about it all, he’s tapping his toes or bouncing his knees or drumming his fingers on his thighs or Kageyama’s thighs or the floor or the table or whatever else he can reach.

Kageyama doesn’t mind it, really. In fact, it’s maybe sort of growing on him, just a little.

But if there’s one thing that’s growing on him _more_ it’s Hinata when he’s not moving, and Hinata is only ever not moving when he’s asleep.

It’s not like Kageyama gets to see him sleeping all that often – only at training camps, really, and maybe the odd sleepover here or there (mostly when Hinata pushes himself too hard and ends up too sleepy to ride his bike home) - but recently Hinata has developed a new… _‘habit’_ , is what everyone is calling it, and it means that Kageyama – and everyone else, for that matter – get to see it a whole lot more.

Hinata has taken to napping. A lot.

He isn’t fussy about where he does it. Kageyama has caught him in all kinds of places; in the clubroom, at his desk, sprawled over the bench where they usually meet for lunch and then there are the… _weirder_ places, too. Like the back of the storage closet. Or that time Kageyama found him passed out on the warm bathroom floor beneath the towel he was meant to use for the shower he didn’t have.

Point is, Hinata has taken to napping anywhere and everywhere and he isn’t at all bothered about where he rests his head.

The only thing he does need is a blanket.

It doesn’t even have to be a real, actual blanket. The towel worked just fine, and Kageyama’s seen him napping under coats and jackets and once, a really long scarf - way too long for someone as tiny as Hinata - and he heard a rumour that Nishinoya found him bundled up with the volleyball net in the corner of the gym when they were supposed to be cleaning up (but he isn’t really sure that’s true).

And this is all fine. Really, it’s all super fine and only a little bit irritating because practice should come before napping but lately it sometimes doesn’t and that’s maybe not okay, but sometimes Kageyama would go so far as to say it’s actually kind of nice. The stillness and the quiet, obviously, not just the sight of Hinata napping because that’d be a really stupid thing to find nice.

The one time it’s very super not fine is when Hinata uses _his_ jacket.

He doesn’t know where it’s gone, at first, and he really can’t believe he’d be stupid enough to leave it in the club room (again) but he’s already double-checked and triple-checked his bag, and he’s definitely not wearing it, and it wasn’t in the gym after practice so really there’s nowhere else it could be.

And it _is_ there, when he opens the door. Unfolded and laid out in the corner beside the back bench and that, in itself, would be weird enough because he doesn’t even _change_ there but what’s even weirder is that Hinata is bundled up under it.

He looks _ridiculous_ , all tucked up on the club room floor with nothing but the toe of one shoe and his face from the nose up peeking out from beneath the black fabric. Kageyama isn’t even sure how the rest of him fits – Hinata’s small, yeah, but surely he can’t be _that_ tiny. But the more Kageyama thinks on it the more he realises that yes, he can be and he _must_ be to curl small enough to turn his jacket into a blanket.

_His_ jacket.                          

Hinata is all kinds of horribly overwhelming at the best of times – he’s loud and he’s clingy and he’s _cute_ – and Kageyama has, for the most part, come to terms with it but _this_. This is the kind of overwhelming that makes his knees weak.

Thing is, he’s seen Hinata in his clothes before. He’s borrowed shirts for sleepovers and gloves when he forgot his own and then there was that one time he accidentally pulled on Kageyama’s school pants after his post-practice shower, and each time it does something painful and probably deadly to Kageyama’s chest.

But he isn’t sure he can handle this – handle Hinata fast asleep with _his_ stupid jacket draped over his stupid, tiny body and his stupid tiny hands curled into the fabric so Kageyama can see the outlines of them and his stupid tiny nose twitching and scrunching where the edge of the collar is just close enough to tickle it.

He spends too long, probably, just…watching. It’s creepy and he hates himself, honestly, but he’s already aware of how painfully weak he can be when Hinata is involved and so he lets himself look, just a little longer.

Hinata looks good – so, stupidly good – when he’s sleeping. It’s something that Kageyama hasn’t really had the time or the chances to get used to and _god_ he needs to stop, he needs to _stop._  

In the end, he rips his jacket away and Hinata hops up like he’s on springs, blinks the clubroom light from his eyes and snatches for the jacket with a loud, echoing, “What the hell, Bakayama!” and Kageyama schools his face into a frown and tries to pretend that the way Hinata’s hair is plastered flat on one side of his head isn’t the cutest, most ridiculous thing he’s ever seen.

“This is mine,” he says, fights the tremor in his tone when Hinata licks his lips and ruffles his hands over his hair.

He shouldn’t be thinking about it, the way Hinata’s tongue darts out to wet his lips, and he absolutely should not be thinking about the way his neck curves back as he stretches himself out and he definitely, one hundred per cent should _not_ be staring at the line of pale, smooth skin peeking above the waist band of his shorts but he is and he can’t look away. He can’t, not even when Hinata’s finger reaches right out to poke him in the cheek.

“Oi, Kageyama.”

Kageyama blinks himself out of whatever stupid trance Hinata put him under (keeps putting him under with ever-increasing frequency) and takes a jerky step back. Hinata is just a little too close, near enough that he’s had to tilt his head a little to look Kageyama in the face and from here is lips look wet and pink and he’s close enough that it wouldn’t be that difficult to just lean down and-

-no. 

Kageyama has somewhat resigned himself to the fact that he likes looking at Hinata far more than he probably should. He’s pretty okay with it, because it really doesn’t have any effect on Hinata and sure, maybe he’s indulged in a few things that boys shouldn’t do whilst thinking about their best friends and maybe it’s been more than a few times but these are things Hinata never, ever has to know about, ever.

Except now Kageyama really, _really_ wants to kiss him and he can’t well keep that a secret.

There’s a long moment of nothing, where Hinata is staring up at him and Kageyama is staring back and thinking about what it might be like to step that little bit closer, to dip his head just enough to feel the press of Hinata mouth on his. This isn’t new; he’s thought about it before, fleetingly, usually in the dark and the quiet with his shirt between his teeth and his hands in places they shouldn’t be, but he’s never really thought about it with Hinata close enough to do it.

It takes some new, unreal level of effort to step back enough to clear his head and when he does, Hinata is looking at him with this weird, questioning kind of look in his eyes.

“You’re being weird,” he says, then tacks on a suspect, “ _again_.”

Kageyama’s fingers itch; he wants to reach out and grab, tug at his hair or pinch his arm, but he’s really, honestly too afraid to let himself any closer to Hinata than he already is so instead he bunches his jacket all the way up in his hands and digs his nails into the fabric till his knuckles go white.

“This is mine.”

Hinata looks at him like he’s the biggest idiot he’s ever encountered which is a) a little ironic considering Hinata is supremely stupid too but b) probably not a huge stretch from the truth. He can imagine he probably looks the part, with the heat in his cheeks and the tension in his shoulders and he forces his mouth down in a scowl.

“Idiot,” he says, and Hinata looks offended for all of two seconds before he puffs out his cheeks and jumps to shout in Kageyama’s face.

Kageyama doesn’t really remember much of the shouting match that ensued, only that Suga breaks them up with a loud, disappointed kind of _tut_ from the door, and that they race to the bike rack and then again to the end of the road, and that he turns his back at the turn off without so much as a backward glance in Hinata’s direction.

**

He spends the night tossing and turning and resolutely ignoring the burn in his cheeks. His head is filled with Hinata and his stupid jacket; first, he’s curled on the club room floor and next he’s sprawled in a seat on the bus, and then he’s tucked against Kageyama’s side, bare skin pressed to Kageyama’s arm beneath the fabric and _now_ he’s not even wearing the jacket and-

He’s weak, he knows it, turning his mouth into his pillow and sliding a sweaty, shaking palm beneath the waistband of his boxers; Hinata is small and cute and (if Kageyama is going to put a name to it) hot, and he is _weak_.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There is actually a second part to this where we're gonna find out why hinata is napping so much and I was gonna write it for this chapter but I wanna keep this fluffy so I'm gonna wait :)))) 
> 
> Thank u for any comments/kudos/bookmarks and things and pls feel free to follow my tumblr @ someone-stole-my-shoes if u wanna talk kagehina with me!!

**Author's Note:**

> sorry it's super sloppy I just ???? love the idea???? of kags loving his smol boy????? But when will he tell him. Will the boner give it away? Who knows. 
> 
> Thank you for reading!! Kudos and comments always appreciated!

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Sweater Paws and Overalls](https://archiveofourown.org/works/8513509) by [CheekyBrunette](https://archiveofourown.org/users/CheekyBrunette/pseuds/CheekyBrunette)




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